Prophet of Destruction, Angel of Death
by Lady Jekyll
Summary: How did Anton Chigurh become the physical epitome of violence? What turned him into the beast we saw in NCFOM? Chapters 4-7 are up. COMPLETE!
1. Birth of the Beast

Prophet of Destruction, Angel of Death

Ch. 1: Birth of the Beast

* * *

Summery: How did Anton Chigurh become the physical epitome of violence? What turned him into the beast we saw in NCFOM?

* * *

A/n: Based on the ideas that a family member gave me concerning Anton's amazing DIY surgery scene and the ultimate badass shooting style he uses throughout the film. I also give a bit of an 'origin-story' for the 'mop-top from Hell' haircut.

* * *

Cambodia, late 1960s or early 1970s

Combat Medic Anton Chigurh sighed as he finished stitching up a head wound on a Cambodian civilian. He knew that the innocent were the first ones to suffer in war and it made him sick to see it first hand. People would come to him, missing limbs and the like. Many died before he could fully help them. He watched children become orphans and parents become childless. One day, movies may make life in war seem glamorous, but it was a vicious lie he'd fight to his dying day. War was neither pleasant, nor charming. _Hell_ was an understatement. There was no word in any language that could fully capture the horror present here.

"Go on," Anton said to the civilian. "Go to your family." The man nodded in gratitude and left. As he cleaned up the area around the medical quarters, he was confronted by Lt. Colonel Carson Wells.

"Hullo, Medic," Wells said in an emotionless voice.

"Colonel Wells," rebuked Chigurh in his deep, husky growl. "What can I do for you?"

"I need you and your medical team to accompany my men and I in finding survivors of a raided villiage. It's not far, about a twenty minute drive from here," Wells said.

"What's the damage?" Anton inquired. Wells sighed, handing Chigurh several freshly developed photographs.

"Our combat photographer, Ike Forte, managed to snap these postcard-worthy scenes before being shot down by sniper-fire," said Wells in blackest sarcasm.

"Forte was married, wasn't he?" Chigurh asked.

"Yep. Wife and two kids at home. Boy and a girl," said Wells.

Chigurh sighed as he began to pack up his supplies.

"In all honesty, Colonel, I don't know what good I'd be able to do," he said. Wells looked somewhat taken aback by Chigurh's words.

"Now is not the time to be doubting your abilities, Medic. Just do what you can," he said.

"I didn't say I was doubting my abilities," Anton replied. "Judging by the photos, I doubt there would be anyone left to save."

"We can't just leave our men to rot in the jungle," Wells said, thrusting a gun into Anton's hands. "Hopefully, some of them might still be alive."

"They won't be if we continue to stand around talking," Chigurh replied, climbing into a jeep.

* * *

"Good God, Forte's photos sugarcoated the hell here!" gasped Wells. Indeed, the villiage was burned to the ground and bodies were strewn like leaves in autumn. Chigurh looked around as he got out of the jeep.

"Search for survivors," he ordered the medical team. "Watch yourselves."

"I don't like this," said Wells quietly as he and Chigurh carefully picked around the area. "Something doesn't feel right."

"Men, women and children shot dead and tossed aside like pieces of meat, damn right something doesn't feel right," Anton said. He caught a small movement out of the corner of his eye. "Forte!" he gasped. "Forte's alive!" he said to Carson. The two ran over to where the fallen combat photographer lay.

Isaac "Ike" Forte flinched in pain as he vainly tried to call out for help. He'd been shot in the lung and his right leg was nearly gone.

"_Please—"_ he whispered, gripping onto Anton's arm. _"Have mercy—end it—end it now."_

"I'm gonna help you the best I can, Ike, understand? Think about your wife and kids. They need you to come home alive," said Anton.

"_Jillian—?"_ gasped Forte. _"She would—understand—in time. Please, Anton—I'm beg—begging you!"_

Anton sighed and sat up on one knee. Forte understood that he was a goner and was ready to face the end. He asked for mercy and Anton would give it to him, even if it would cost him his own soul. Until this moment, Anton Chigurh had never killed another human being. Chigurh braced himself and shot Forte at point-blank range, killing him instantly.

Wells nodded silently, understanding that it was a mercy killing. He turned at a strange whizzing sound. There was a spurt of blood and Anton was suddenly on his back, howling. Carson quickly moved to Chigurh's side. He'd been shot in the side of the neck. The bullet had taken the lower half of Anton's left ear and had severely nicked his artery.

"Shit!" Wells said. "Calm down, calm down. Hang on, Anton, it's going to be all right," he went on, clogging the artery with his fingers.

"_Cuh—Carson—!"_ Anton sputtered. He let out another howl before everything went black.


	2. From Jekyll to Hyde

Prophet of Destruction, Angel of Death

Ch. 2: From Jekyll to Hyde

* * *

A/n: This is fun! And for all the folks with odd tastes, I am writing a Chigurh/Wells slash piece. There are theories concerning how Carson and Anton 'knew' each other. Please tell me I am not the only one who would burn down a barn to see that? I am? Ah, crap…

* * *

Anton knew that Death had his skeletal hand on him. The old saying was true: before death, the images of everything one had ever cared about flashed in front of them. And Anton Chigurh was no exception. His mother's face. The first girl he ever kissed. Joining the army, thinking he was invincible. The conversations and cigarettes with the soldiers at the start of this hell…

As soon as the images came, they vanished just as instantly. Pain was the only thing he could feel now. An intensely cold, paralyzing pain. Voices seemed to come from nowhere. Some were Cambodian, maybe Vietnamese. Another was American. Was this hell? Anton could hear his own voice screaming, but he couldn't open his eyes. What was going on? Shouldn't Death be quick, like snuffing out a candle?

_"No! I am not coming back alone! He's alive, goddammit! Fuck you, boy, now get him in that ambulance, you hear me?"_

Anton recognized Carson Wells' drawl. Now if only he knew exactly what the hell was going on here.

Finally, he did.

* * *

"Welcome back to the land of the living, Medic," said Carson Wells when Anton finally awoke. "Gave me quite a scare, and that is somethin' that's hard to do."

"Where—?" Chigurh croaked, his voice hoarse. He blinked a few times, as though trying to get his sight to focus. Carson was sitting in a hard metal chair, bandages wrapped around his right forearm. Aside from that and several cuts and bruises, he looked relatively unharmed.

"We're back in the States," Wells said. "Have been for about a week. You've been out for quite a while. Nearly died on me several times. I was damned if I'd let the Reaper take the best man in Army medicine."

"What—happened?" Anton inquired. Wells got him a drink of water before speaking.

"You sound like you've been gargling nails. Drink that," he said with a weak grin. "Do you remember what happened? After the mercy killing of Ike Forte?"

Anton shut his eyes again, racking his brain; trying to remember anything.

"There was this—white hot pain in the side of my neck. I only remember feeling the blood rush through my fingers. Other than that, I don't remember anything," said Chigurh quietly.

"The sound of your gun caused an ambush. Those of us who weren't shot dead were taken prisoner. How you managed to hang on for as long as you did in the camp, I don't know. You got sick, I'm sorry to say. Tetanus. I was tempted to just put you out of your misery, like you did for Forte. I don't know why, but I couldn't do it. You just had this _look_ in your eyes. I can't place what it was, but it scared the living _shit_ out of me. As long as you had that fire in your eyes, I couldn't touch you," Wells said. He sighed and continued. "You know your protégée? That cute little thing from Vegas? Lucy McCarthy, that's her name. Anyway, she's here. Damn bastards at the POW camp tortured her and took her eyes."

"_What?"_ gasped Anton. "What do you mean _they took her eyes?_"

"I hope your illness hasn't affected your intelligence, Anton," said the quiet voice of Lucy McCarthy. Wells rose from his seat and allowed the girl to sit in his place. McCarthy had bandages wrapped around her eyes, as though blindfolded. "It means exactly what you think. I'm blind now."

"Why? Why _you?"_ Anton demanded. "How in God's name can you not be wanting revenge?"

"I understand that I cannot change what has happened to me," Lucy explained. "Getting revenge would not give me back my eyes, Anton. Again, I understand that I cannot change what has happened, but I can change my _reaction_. I'm not going to build up a hatred for humanity because I can't see anymore. And neither should you."

"I never said I did," replied Chigurh.

"Once the painkillers wear off and reality sets in, you will," Lucy said. "Think before you act on anything. You can't control fate, remember that." That said, Lucy walked off, clinging to the arm of a doctor.

"Load of Buddhist mumbo-jumbo," said Wells. "I don't understand why she would adopt the faith of the country that destroyed our lives."

* * *

During his hospital stay, Anton had requested that Lucy lend him the books she had concerning Buddhist philosophy. Though still ill and lethargic from blood loss, Anton read and reread the books until he had memorized every word, even the publisher's address. After several weeks, he had an enlightenment of his own and shared his thoughts with Carson Wells.

"I've read that, over time, one can become the embodiment of the Buddhist virtues. Compassion, loving-kindness, mercy, what have you. What I'm getting at is this: what if one can embody the _opposite_ of those virtues? Violence, anger, cruelty—if it is possible to become the epitome of mercy, couldn't I do the reverse and become the epitome of cruelty?"

Wells took a long drag on a cigarette before speaking.

"I don't know how to answer that, Anton," he said. His voice was emotionless, but he was worried. His eyes said it all. He fully realized that this man in the hospital bed was not the same Anton Chigurh he had known back in Cambodia. That man was dead now. "Why would you want to live your life like that? After all you've read, don't you see where traveling down that path would lead you?"

"Sympathy and goodness do not last!" Chigurh said in a near rage. "You can't negotiate peacefully when someone is shoving the barrel of a loaded gun down your throat! Is that what you would do, after all you have seen? Compassion cannot quell violence. You, of all people, know this!"

"People have tried—" started Wells in protest.

"Oh, indeed they have. Christ, Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. are some examples. And what happened to them?" Chigurh went on, that same feverish fire Carson had seen in the POW camp burning in his dark eyes. "I know you are not stupid, Carson. _What happened to them?"_

Wells' voice shook as he spoke. He was terrified of that inhuman light dancing in Chigurh's eyes. "They—they were killed."

"_Exactly,"_ said Anton in little above a whisper. "Do you understand where I am coming from now? Even the _Son of God Himself_ couldn't put a stop to violence! How disturbing is that? Why even bother for looking for goodness in this world anymore?"

That was a question Wells could not answer. Anton smirked at the other man's silence and continued on.

"It amazes me, truly amazes me, that though weaponry, means of defense and battle plans have changed over the millennia, the motives for war have not. In ancient times, wars were fought for monetary gain. There was also the need to increase territory, or to prove a point in religious views. Rebel factions would overthrow corrupt aristocracies, monarchies and empires. France, Spain, Russia and even America herself fought such wars. I am astounded at man's inhumanity to man. Something must be done about it," Chigurh explained.

"Violence wouldn't solve that problem!" said Carson, horrified as he realized just how ill Anton truly was. He was deranged, obsessed with the ideas of fate and of the lack of goodness in the world.

"Then _what_ would, Carson?" Anton inquired in a malevolently quiet tone. Wells would have felt much more in control of the situation if Anton had shouted. The coldness in his voice did not match the fever-induced hellfire in his eyes.

"Listen to yourself, Anton. You're sick and raving. Get some sleep. Once you wake up, you'll start thinking clearly," said Wells. Chigurh flashed a smile that went no deeper than his teeth and he slowly shook his head.

"No," he said with a cold chuckle. "For the first time in my life I _am_ thinking clearly. I am awake now. Awake and _alive_."


	3. A Man of Principle

Prophet of Destruction, Angel of Death

Ch. 3: A Man of Principle

* * *

Several days after coming to his revelation, Anton finally gained the physical and mental strength with which to put his ideas into practice. He would wait until dark when it would, in his mind, be safer. Carson was blathering animatedly about how he had told Lucy McCarthy of Anton's 'enlightenment' and the ideas that sprang forth from it. Apparently, the blind woman had dubbed it Anton's 'anti-enlightenment', and wanted to talk to him as soon as possible. Not wanting to believe that teachings of peace and compassion could be perverted in such a heretical way, Lucy would not allow Wells to act as a mediator. She wanted Anton to come to her on his own terms and tell her his ideas himself.

"Religious teachings are like people," Anton said, the harshness in his voice stunning Carson into silence. "Torture them long enough, and you can get them to say anything you want. The Spanish Inquisition did it. Why shouldn't I?" He cocked his head slightly, giving Wells a rather amused look before lunging at him. Chigurh wrapped his hands around Wells' throat, choking him. Carson clawed at Anton's hands, even managing to leave a long series of scratches at the base of Chigurh's right thumb. The scratches trailed down to his wrist a little as Wells slipped into unconsciousness.

Anton finally let Wells go, watching the slow, steady pulse from the vein in the side of his neck. Chigurh then put his hand to the side of his own neck. A padding of gauze and surgical tape prevented him from feeling his own pulse. For some reason for which he would never be able to explain, that made him feel more alive than anything he previously experienced.

He then moved his hand to what remained of his left ear. Anton looked at his reflection in a bathroom mirror, scowling at it. As though possessed by this newfound animalistic side to himself, Chigurh slammed his fist into the mirror. His reflection was now reduced to a spider web-like mosaic of cracked glass. He rubbed his bleeding knuckles as he moved, walking out of his room and down the hall a ways. At last, he found the room he was looking for. He stood in the doorway, silent as stone and patient as same, waiting and wondering if the blind Lucy McCarthy would know he was there.

"Hello, Anton. I recognized the sound of your footsteps," Lucy said. "Is it true what Carson told me? You are doing the opposite of Buddha's teachings?"

"Only a fool would strive for goodness and sympathy in a world where it doesn't exist. In order to destroy violence, you have to embrace it," Anton said.

Lucy sighed, her voice was quiet as she slowly shook her head.

"Anton, what has happened to you? God, what I'd give to see your face so I could know it was really you. You have the voice of the man I knew, but you aren't the same," she said.

"No, that Anton Chigurh is dead," agreed the soon-to-be epitome of violence. "That man was the shell—the cocoon for the _real_ man."

"Are you not hearing your own voice, Anton?" Lucy demanded. "I can hear the fork in your tongue! What changed you? Did killing Ike Forte cause this?"

"That act of compassion nearly _killed_ me," Chigurh said. "I would have woken up to this realization at some point in my life anyway. Why should I fight it? Why are _you_ trying to change me?"

Lucy was thoughtful for a moment. After a small silence, she spoke, saying, "Do you not understand what sort of karmic Hell you are creating for yourself?" Her voice now gained an oddly prophetic ring to it as she continued. "Should you go through with this and cause pain and suffering in others, it will only rebound itself on you. You are going to end up a broken man, Anton."

Deep in his subconscious, the blind woman's words spooked him. He mentally shook off the feeling and laughed.

"Well now, has losing your eyes transformed you into the Oracle of Delphi?" he asked, taking her by the hand. "You, too, were hurt and yet you have not changed. You're still the woman I knew back in Cambodia."

"But _you_ are _not_ the man I knew then," Lucy replied. Anton, stung, swallowed down the impulse to strike her. "I understand that getting hurt can change a person, but this normally isn't the type of change people experience. _This_ is utter insanity. This isn't enlightenment, Anton, but the ravings of a madman! You need help."

"_Are you saying I'm crazy?"_ Chigurh asked in a dangerously quiet voice.

"There isn't a word for what you are," Lucy said in a voice as cold as Anton's was quiet. "I know the real reason you're here. Kill me if you like. I won't stop you."

Anton smiled a little, pulling out a quarter from his pocket.

"I won't be the one who'll kill you. I'll leave that up to you," he said in a frigidly earnest tone. He chuckled, placing the quarter between his thumb and forefinger. "Heads or tails?"

"This is insane. Why make me choose? You're here to kill me, so _kill me_!" McCarthy said.

"_No!"_ Chigurh said loudly. He lowered his voice and continued. "If I killed you, it would be murder. Calling heads or tails will enable me to know if it is your appointed time. I can't touch you until Fate gives me an answer."

Lucy sighed, her voice tight as though she wanted to cry. It wasn't in fear for her own life. It was pity for Anton's transformation.

"Did I do the right thing in helping Carson save you? What have you become?" She swallowed hard and sealed her fate. "Tails."

Anton flipped the coin and balanced it on his inner wrist. He cast a glance at the blind woman, one of the few people he allowed himself to befriend. _No_, he thought, _I have no need for friends now. This is the path I've chosen and I'll walk it alone._ Chigurh then turned his attention to the coin. It was heads. He sighed heavily.

"I'm sorry, Lucy," he said. Without a second thought, he slipped the blade of a knife between McCarthy's ribs. Lucy shuddered and gasped. "Don't fight me," Anton went on, slowly, even gently, lowering her to the floor. "I don't want you to feel any pain." Chigurh then gave the knife a hard, sharp twist. Lucy gasped again, her hand clenched tightly around Anton's wrist. Finally, her grip slackened and she didn't move again. "It's over now," Chigurh said quietly. He picked up Lucy's body and laid her on the bed. Anton fished out another quarter from his pocket and placed both coins on the bandages where Lucy's eyes once were. With this respectful gesture for the dead done, Anton washed the blood from his hands and walked out, unnoticed, from the hospital.


	4. Perfecting the Craft

Prophet of Destruction, Angel of Death

Ch. 4: Perfecting the Craft

A/n: While watching _No Country For Old Men_ and having overdosed on caffeine, I imagined Anton wielding a freaking chainsaw throughout the movie. Awesome…hot and awesome. That's right, Chigurh-Daddy, embrace your inner Leatherface! References to the movie _Goya's Ghosts_.

* * *

In the months following his escape from the hospital, Anton had gotten a job as a butcher in a meat packing plant near the Texas-Mexico border. He was also living under the assumed name of Lorenzo Casamares, but he maintained his veteran status. Many of the other workers had developed an uneasiness while working with him. One of his coworkers, Bernie Mayhew, a 20-something kid, was the one of the few there who even bothered to talk to him. Mayhew watched Anton in surprise as he started getting a little too enthusiastic with a meat cleaver.

"Easy, easy! Lorenzo, I understand that you're a war vet and that you've got a lot of pent up rage, but people are going to be eating this stuff, okay? We need to find you a different outlet to vent on," he said.

"What sort of outlet are you thinking of?" Anton asked, turning the collar of his uniform up to hide the scars on the side of his neck and pulling his hat over his mutilated left ear. He tensed as one of the other workers, Pablo Cortez, gently pulled him back by the collar of his uniform with a meat hook.

"You can take me on, Casamares," he said. "I spent a year in prison for murder. Funny thing, how you can't be arrested for the murders you committed."

"Seriously, Pablo, I don't think this would be a good idea," said Bernie nervously. "He—he's a war vet!"

"Shut the fuck up, _pendaijo_! Either way, he's still a murderer. A murderer who can't be imprisoned for what he did," Cortez went on.

"The memories are prison enough," Anton said. "I don't think you fully understand just what I kind of hurt I can do to you."

Another worker elbowed Bernie in the ribs, smiling.

"Oh man, look at his eyes. Look at his eyes!" he whispered. Bernie was looking nervously between Chigurh and Cortez. He knew that one of them wouldn't be walking away.

"You can't do shit to me, Casamares!" Cortez said. "How many innocent people did you kill, huh? How many women did you--?" He was cut off as Anton hit him over the head with an oxygen tank that was used for the captive bolt pistols in the slaughterhouse.

"_I would never!"_ Anton raged. "I only did what I was ordered. I had no choice." He slung the tank over his shoulder, ready to deliver another, fatal blow.

"Lorenzo, stop!" said Bernie, jerking the tank out of Chigurh's hand. "He's not worth it. Calm down, calm down. He ain't worth it."

"I'll stop when I'm good and ready," Anton growled. He bound the dazed man's hands together with chains, throwing open the door to a meat locker as he moved. Chigurh then lifted Cortez up, hanging him by the chains from a meat hook. He grinned as Cortez began pleading for his life in Spanish. The meat locker door closed and Cortez began screaming. Anton's smile widened. "You brought this on yourself, friend-o."


	5. Violence Enchained

Prophet of Destruction, Angel of Death

Ch. 5: Violence Enchained

* * *

A/n: Anyone else question Anton's sexuality while watching the movie? C'mon—think about it. Strangling the cop scene is a big tip off. When Wells mentions an ATM shortly before his death, Anton's eyes light up (he's supposed to "be above money or drugs" due to his priorities). He's too friendly ('friend-o-lee'?) with Carson anyway… Oh, did I mention Javier Bardem played the lead in _Before Night Falls_? I watched it for you, Javi, but dear God…don't get me wrong, I love gay people, but I can't look at Johnny Depp the same way anymore, man…

* * *

Retired army Colonel Carson Wells ambled into a Mexican jail, intrigued to see about a violent prisoner. The prisoner, so Wells had bee told, was no man, but a monster that those around him had dubbed _El Lobo_. The only real identification the man had was a pair of army dog tags. Wells approached a cell, the right corner of his mouth curling into a grin.

"Hullo, Anton. Remember me?" he inquired.

Anton Chigurh glowered back at him from behind the bars of his cell. He'd been imprisoned for a little over a year and basically took a vow of silence. Chigurh's dark hair went down to his neck, covering the battle scars from war. He himself made no sound, but the shackles around his wrists and ankles did when a guard slammed a small club against the back of his head.

"_¡Hablar!"_ the guard snarled at him.

"_¡Alto!"_ said Carson, putting up a hand to stop the guard. "It's all right. _Bueno."_

"I don't need your help, Carson," Anton rasped, his voice hoarse from disuse. "I killed my way in here, I'll kill my way out."

"How'd you get yourself in here?" Wells asked.

"I just told you," Chigurh replied, his soulless eyes glittering as he spoke.

"You know what I mean."

Anton told Wells about his work as a butcher. About attacking Pablo Cortez. How he killed every worker there before setting the place on fire. The whole time, Wells merely nodded, as though trying to sympathize with Chigurh's motivation for the damning deeds he committed.

"I'm here," Carson said at last, "to offer you a job." Anton eyed him suspiciously. "I'm into…repossession services, one might say. People owe a certain payment and I take it."

"You kill for money," Anton said, easily understanding the metaphor.

"Yep," said Wells with a smirk. "Caught me tryin' to be fancy."

"You're not the most—prolific of speakers," replied Anton with a cruel smile. "However, the barrel of a loaded gun speaks better than words in any setting."

"Amen to that," agreed Carson. "I have one thousand pesos on me as we speak, more than enough to bail you out. You have skills that should not be wasted, Anton. I have to use a gun to get people to squawk, all you have to do is just use that fire in your eyes. You'd be paid half before an assignment and the rest once it's done. Around five grand per kill. What do you say?"

"I say 'get me the hell outta here'," Chigurh replied. He hated the idea of relying on Wells for his freedom, but this was an angle that he'd better damn play. Wells grinned, snapping his fingers. The same guard who had clubbed Anton over the head suddenly looked afraid. He quickly unlocked the cell and released Chigurh from the manacles around his wrists and ankles. Anton thought he'd have one last bout of "fun", lunging at the guard as though to attack him. The guard swore in Spanish, crossing himself.

Anton was then given the items he had taken away from him when he'd first been arrested. A shotgun with what looked like a custom-made silencer and a bowie knife were the most recognizable of the items. The one Wells couldn't place was a lightweight oxygen tank with a hose connected to what looked like a captive-bolt pistol.

"What in God's name is that?" Carson asked as Chigurh slung the tank over his shoulder. He looked like the Orkin man from Hell.

"The last thing many people ever see," Anton replied, slinging the silencer-equipped shotgun across his other shoulder. "Quick, clean and painless."

"So you say," Wells said as he and Chigurh walked out the door. Anton winced at the bright sunlight, shielding his eyes with his hand. Carson handed him a pair of sunglasses.

"How'd you get so tan being locked up in that hellhole?"

Chigurh put on the sunglasses, waiting until his eyes adjusted to the light.

"Chain-gang," he said. "Doing road repair. I wasn't allowed out until now because I killed a guard with a pickaxe."

"I am still amazed at how much you've changed in a little over a year," Wells said. "You hungry?"

"Starving," Anton said, stashing his weaponry in the trunk of Carson's rental car.

"Good. I know a place where we can get dinner and a show."

* * *

Wells led Anton into a seedy club and ordered two steaks as wells as several beers before disappearing into a crowd of patrons. Anton took a seat, irritated that Carson would drag him into this cheap whorehouse. _Disgusting,_ Chigurh thought, _hedonism at its finest._ His thoughts of Wells' sickening decent into debauchery were broken when the aforementioned Carson Wells returned to the booth. He had two rather pretty young women, one on each arm, grinning.

"Ladies, this is my good friend, Anton Chigurh," he said. One of the women smiled prettily at Anton and sat beside him. Chigurh rolled his eyes, taking a swig of beer.

"This is sickening," Anton whispered. "Do you really think I'm the kinda guy who'd go for this?"

"You're a straight-shooter with a gun—everything else is up in the air," replied Wells, taking a pull on a cigarette. "Hell, Lucy McCarthy, God rest her soul, would always cast 'screw-me' glances at you, but you never acted on it."

"Don't you dare mention her!" Chigurh snarled in a dangerous whisper.

"C'mon, Anton, she only wanted to bed you, not wed you! Don't tell me that you didn't know?"

"Drop it."

"You _didn't_ know, did you?"

Anton felt a violent rage burn inside him where his soul once was. He wanted to kill every last person in this building and never look back. Chigurh sighed and swallowed his rage along with another swig of beer. These people needn't suffer for Wells' sins. Retribution would come in time. Fate would tell him when.

"I knew," he said at last. "And I did nothing."

"Why not?"

"I have no interest in physical passion. My interests are beyond the veil of the flesh," Chigurh replied in a dead voice.

"Kafka," said the prostitute sitting beside Anton.

"What?" Chigurh asked, jerking his head in the hooker's direction.

"You're quoting Kafka," the woman noted.

"Yes, I am. What of it?"

"Are you interested or not?"

"No."

Carson laughed heartily, pulling Anton's rejected lady onto his lap.

"What are you, Anton? A queer or a monk?"

Anton cracked his neck audibly, opening another bottle of beer as he rose to his feet.

"Neither. I'm a man who wouldn't hesitate to take a gun and blow your damned head off in front of these whores. I'm going to a hotel, now leave me the hell alone."


	6. The Invinciable Anton Chigurh

Prophet of Destruction, Angel of Death

Ch. 6: The Invincible Anton Chigurh

A/n: Second to last chapter! This is a homage to particular line in the novel. For some reason, it wasn't mentioned in the movie. The chapter takes place 19 years after chapter 5.

* * *

USA-Mexico border town, 1980,

19 years had passed since Anton's transformation. He looked like a human being and functioned like one when he had to. That said, there was no real humanity underneath the mask. Basically, the only sign Anton was even real was the fact that he could bleed. He knew of the hushed whispers, the fear people had of him. Even the men he worked for, whose names he didn't know, knew him as _El Lobo_—The Wolf. The police in this sleepy part of the world were asinine and too old-fashioned. Perhaps _they_ were afraid of him, too.

_Let them fear me_, Anton thought as he pushed through a set of doors to a diner for supper. _People should always fear what they don't understand._ Chigurh ordered his meal and sat sipping his beer in silence. There was a group of kids, unemployed 20-somethings by the looks of them, sitting at the counter, snickering and drinking. One of them turned his head, glancing at Anton over his shoulder.

"_El Lobo!"_ he whispered. Anton paused for a second, nodding his thanks to the waitress who brought him his meal and began eating. _"El Lobo!"_ the man said in a louder voice. Still, Anton ignored him, eating in silence. His face was, as customary, expressionless. If this punk could see the fire and brimstone smoldering in Anton's eyes, he would take his friends' advice and shut the hell up. Anton rose from his seat and walked up to the counter to pay his check. All the while, he mentally summed up, not the total sum of _money _he owed, but his _justification_ for murder:

_Alcohol and stupidity are reason enough. What's one simpleton more or less?_

And apparently, stupidity was not silent for the punk repeated his words, fully giving Anton reason to dispatch him. Chigurh silently jerked his head for the kid and his buddies to meet him out in the parking lot. The drunk idiots ambled out of the diner, realizing, too late, that they had made a very foolish mistake. Anton grabbed hold of the punk who had spoken to him. The kid's friends had no idea what had happened, it was all too fast. One second, their buddy was grabbed, the next he was lying on the pavement.

"Oh shit! What the hell happened?" asked one.

"Wake up, man, c'mon," said the other, grabbing the fallen punk's shoulder and tapping him on the cheek. Anton watched silently, amused. "Holy Hell! He's _dead_! Jesus!"

"What the fuck? It looked like a sleeper hold or something!"

Anton managed to quietly slip away, unnoticed.

* * *

An hour later, Anton had been arrested by a deputy sheriff outside of Sonora, Texas. It wasn't for the murder an hour before. No, Chigurh himself wasn't even sure how he came to be handcuffed. All he really wanted to find out was if escape by force of will was possible. He smiled as he listened to the deputy as he spoke on the phone with the sheriff.

"Just walked in the door. Sheriff, he had some sort of thing on him, like one of them oxygen tanks for emphysema or whatever. Then he had a hose that run down his sleeve and went to one of them stun guns like they use at the slaughterhouse. Well, that's what it looked like. Yessir. You can see it when you get in. I got it covered. Yessir."

Poor fool never knew what hit him.


	7. A Broken Man

Prophet of Destruction, Angel of Death

Ch. 7: A Broken Man

* * *

A/n: Karma's a bitch.

* * *

Several weeks had passed since the bloodbath. Carson Wells was dead. Anton had made good on his vow to kill him. It was amusing to see how Wells had abandoned so much just for money. Chigurh himself was driving down a quiet suburban street after having get away with yet another murder. Anton didn't know her name, only that she was the widow of the man he'd been ordered to track down. Moss's wife. Her refusal to call her fate had brought back memories of Lucy McCarthy. On both occasions, the women had seemed, not fearful for their lives, but pity for the path he, Anton Chigurh, had chosen for himself. If Anton was capable of feeling fear, he didn't then.

But it changed in about ten seconds…

He never saw the car coming when the accident happened. All he felt was a sudden jolt and breaking glass. Anton stumbled out of the car, panting. He collapsed, dazed, onto the curb, rolling up the sleeve of his shirt. His killing-arm was broken so badly that bone was protruding through the skin. What would become of him if this injury meant he would never kill again? His head spinning, he bribed a teenage boy for his shirt so he could make a sling for his arm.

"When the help gets here, tell them you didn't see me. I was already gone," he told the teen. Anton the shakily rose to his feet and stumbled down the street in the opposite direction of the sirens that were becoming more and more distinct. Chigurh sighed, watching the sun set as he walked. The sun had cast a blood-red glow on the horizon.

_You were right, Lucy,_ Anton thought. _You were right._


End file.
